Austrian village wants to change name from curse word to Fugging

Salzburg
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The 104 residents of an Austrian town are tired of the jokes, the prank calls and people stealing their traffic signs. Now they want to change the name of their town from Fucking to Fugging but there is already another town with that name.

The citizens of the town of Fucking in northern Austria, near the border with Germany, have had enough and want to change the name of their locality.

The word Fucking does not exist in German, but many English-speaking tourists travel to the remote Austrian village just to have their picture taken in front of the signs announcing the arrival to the town, others have been caught actually doing what the sign says, and some even take the signs home so they can display them at their bedroom’s door.

One of the signs that got stolen most frequently was that showing the name of the town, “Fucking”, followed by the additional legend "Bitte – nicht so schnell!" ("Please — not so fast!"). The sign also had the picture of two kids and intended to ask drivers to watch their speed because of children on the road.

The name of the village comes from Focko, the last name of a 6th Century Bavarian nobleman, also known as Adalpertus de Fucingin. The name has undergone several modifications through history: First it was known as Funcingin, then as Fukching and later as Fugkhing. In 1760 the village took its current name, Fucking, which can be loosely translated to English as “Inhabitant of Ancient Fucingin”.

The residents of Fucking (demonym: Fuckingers) are well aware of the notoriety and are not amused. They are promoting the installation of lights and cameras to deter those attempt to photograph themselves having sex under the road signs and have organized a referendum to change the name of the village. This is not the first time they try that. A few years ago, about a hundred villagers said no to the change arguing that Fucking has a long and heroic history dating back a thousand years. Things are getting worse and now they are seriously considering changing the name from Fucking to “Fugging”. Unfortunately, the Fuckingers may have a hard time changing the name of the village to Fugging because, according to the Mirror.co.uk that name is already taken.

There are many odd names for places and towns all over the world. Canada has its fair share. There is a long list of unusual toponymy (etymological, historical study of the name of geographical places) in all Canadian provinces. A few that stand-out in connection with this story are: Climax, Saskatchewan, Dildo, Newfoundland and Sexmith, Alberta. And how about Intercourse, Pennsylvania in the United States?